Anti-Heroes, Power and Islamic Reform Reflected in Two Iranian Films David Sander Stonehill College, [email protected]
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Journal of Religion & Film Volume 17 Article 4 Issue 2 October 2013 10-2-2013 Love that Tames: Anti-Heroes, Power and Islamic Reform Reflected in Two Iranian Films David Sander Stonehill College, [email protected] Recommended Citation Sander, David (2013) "Love that Tames: Anti-Heroes, Power and Islamic Reform Reflected in Two Iranian Films," Journal of Religion & Film: Vol. 17 : Iss. 2 , Article 4. Available at: https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/jrf/vol17/iss2/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@UNO. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of Religion & Film by an authorized editor of DigitalCommons@UNO. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Love that Tames: Anti-Heroes, Power and Islamic Reform Reflected in Two Iranian Films Abstract This paper is an exploration of two Iranian films that draw upon spiritual, artistic and literary roots in Islamic history, while at the same time engaging in critiques of knowledge and power in contemporary Muslim societies. These films offer a chance to explore ways in which culture (as distinct from theological discourse) deals with problems of reform in Muslim societies. This article juxtaposes the films with the trickster archetype in folklore, Sufi thought about leadership, and beliefs about the figure of the Mahdi (“the guided one” mentioned in Prophetic hadith as preceding the second coming of Jesus). Keywords mysticism, leadership, Sufism, Islam, trickster, archetype, reform Author Notes David Sander is Assistant Professor of History at Stonehill College. His research Interests include poetics and folklore in Classical & Contemporary Islamic/Sufi iH story. He gratefully acknowledges the editorial suggestions of Elliott aB zanno and all those who reviewed this article. This article is available in Journal of Religion & Film: https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/jrf/vol17/iss2/4 Sander: Love that Tames INTRODUCTION Outside observers often overlook the diversity of views within the Muslim world, as do many Muslims as well. Understanding artistic expressions from unfamiliar religious worlds usually demands a struggle. It would take mastery of languages and much historical study for outsiders to comprehend poetic and other literary traditions in their full context, since they have emerged from deep roots over time. While we can debate about Islam by seeking to interpret texts and media headlines, we should not miss the opportunities provided by contemporary film. Film allows diverse visions of Islam to reach us across difficult boundaries. The reform of Muslim societies has been a topic of controversy for centuries, generating long-lived questions. Are modernity and Islam mutually exclusive? Is it necessary to leave religion behind in order to improve Muslim societies? Does critical self-examination negate traditions of faith and spirituality? Countless intellectuals and ideologues within and outside the ummah have debated these topics. I contend that some Muslim film-makers have made unique contributions that offer useful answers and reveal a sophisticated unofficial channel for reformist thought latent within culture. One might presume that critical perspectives are strictly modern. The Islamic impulse toward reform (islah) is often thought of as a historical reaction to the challenges of European colonialism and subsequent modern crises. But ample evidence of reformist thought presents itself in folklore, poetic and other Published by DigitalCommons@UNO, 2013 1 Journal of Religion & Film, Vol. 17 [2013], Iss. 2, Art. 4 literary expressions in Islamic history stretching back for centuries, and now in film. A recurring theme within them can be put in the form of a question: how can spiritual authority (coming from God) take its rightful role in human affairs when raw political authority (a regime or ideological movement) by its nature constantly seeks to coopt and subordinate it? Will coercive power succeed in dominating subtler forms of power? Put another way, does the inner power of love, though often concealed and unnoticed, stand a chance of transforming the world? In this article, I will examine two very different Iranian films for a look at their filmic arguments about power, love, leadership and Islamic reform. The first film, The Lizard (2004), directed by Kamal Tabrizi, draws upon a comedic trickster archetype in Islamic folklore. The second, A Time for Drunken Horses (2000), by Bahman Ghobadi, is a dramatic work of realism depicting the life of orphaned Kurdish children in a dangerous border region. While these two films differ widely in genre, setting, and atmosphere, they each center around an anti- heroic figure, and in diverse ways, each suggests subtle visions of the meaning of leadership. THE TRUE LEADER AND THE TRICKSTER MULLAH The Lizard is about a thief who escapes prison in the robes of a mullah (a shi’i Islamic scholar) and in this assumed role becomes an accepted, and even quite https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/jrf/vol17/iss2/4 2 Sander: Love that Tames popular, figure. How do we begin to understand this ironic scenario beyond its obvious comedic surface? First, it is helpful to explore some background on religious authority in Islamic history. In any religious worldview, the true leader is one whose worldly authority somehow derives from or otherwise combines with spiritual authority. For Muslims the Prophet Muhammad exemplified the balance of political and spiritual authority. However, after he died, disputes arose about the nature of the authority of his successors. Those who came to be known as Sunnis generally hold that the authority of Muslim rulers could only be political, since spiritual authority resided in the Prophet and his sunnah or personal example, preserved in texts and communal memory. Those who came to be known as Shi’ites, on the other hand, hold that both political and spiritual authority are preserved in the family of the Prophet and particularly those Imams who descended from his daughter Fatima. The mystical tradition in Islam, which is not tied strictly to either Shi’a or Sunni positions, is often referred to by the term Sufism. Sufis tend to focus on the preservation of spiritual authority in lines of teachers. In Sufi language, only a rare person is the insan al-kamil (the complete human being), who is the “meeting of the two seas” 1, the one who brings inner and outer sides of religion together: the “night” of intuition, imagination and mercy, joined with the “day” of reason and justice. Such a person may combine what we call soft and hard power, but often does not lay claim to any political authority over others. Published by DigitalCommons@UNO, 2013 3 Journal of Religion & Film, Vol. 17 [2013], Iss. 2, Art. 4 An archetypal Qur’anic story gives context to debates on true leadership within the Muslim ummah. In the Surah of the Cave (18:60-82), the figure of Moses, though already a prophet conveying divine law, is searching for a spiritual guide. He wanders through the desert with his servant seeking “the meeting of the two seas.” In a miraculous moment, Moses encounters his guide, the mysterious, saintly figure known as Khidr, and begins traveling with him. Khidr tests the open-mindedness of even this honored prophet through a series of seemingly outrageous acts with which Moses, who has sworn obedience to Khidr, cannot have patience. This story exemplifies why over the centuries, the Sufis for the most part have been content with spiritual guides who laid no claim to political power. It is also why Muslims at large, none moreso than the Shi’a, have been awaiting the promised guide, the Mahdi (the “guided one”) who, according to tradition, will return near the end of time to unite the Muslim community and bring spiritual and political leadership together.2 In the meantime, Muslims have also been telling jokes. The paradoxes of spiritual authority were discussed in humorous tales among the masses, as well as in poetry.3 They appear throughout the Muslim world in jokes about the ubiquitous “Mullah Nasruddin” character. Mullah Nasruddin is every bit the classical trickster figure: while secure in his title (and turbaned appearance) as a mullah, or appointed religious scholar, he is simultaneously a wise-cracker, fraud, https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/jrf/vol17/iss2/4 4 Sander: Love that Tames prankster, thief and fool. Yet in spite of his tricks, he reveals aspects of truth that can only be described indirectly.4 Reza, the hero, or rather the anti-hero of Tabrizi’s film The Lizard seems to connect directly with the Mulla Nasruddin figure. The trickster is an archetypal character who, despite all of society’s idealistic messages about “life as it should be”, reconnects us with “life as it is”: not predictable, not ideal, not black-and- white. Trickster myths are found in every culture because their irony is essential to the survival of culture itself. As Lewis Hyde puts it, “the origins, liveliness, and durability of cultures require that there be space for figures whose function is to uncover and disrupt the very things that cultures are based on.”5 According to Hyde, trickster myths play an essential role in the well-being of society by allowing renewal of its core values, which have been otherwise routinized. As funny and ambiguous, even rude, as he seems (and tricksters are most often male), the trickster is held as a sacred figure. Trickster myths bring up the hidden hypocrisies of socio-religious systems that have been weakened by their own idealism. In doing so, they enable a reconnection to original core truths.6 As often as Mullah Nasruddin succeeds in tricking others with his clothes and turban, he is also himself tricked and made the butt of jokes. He knows how to expose hypocrites, because he is one himself. The enduring popularity of Mullah Nasruddin indicates the power of his archetypal nature in Muslim cultures.